Pandering Tastes Like Chicken: Christian College Hosts 'People of Color' Appreciation Lunch

Hold up your arm to a crayon box. If your skin is sufficiently dimmer than Peach, a Minnesota school invites you to a meal.

To be clear, that’s the case if you’re on staff.

You could wonder which achievement of yours is being awarded, but it might be best to eschew questions and just enjoy the free food.

As relayed by The College Fix, Gustavus Adolphus College is hosting a People of Color International Faculty and Staff Appreciation Lunch.

University of Michigan Flint Professor Mark Perry sent a screenshot of the registration form to the Fix.

Mark’s unimpressed — he’s filed a complaint with the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR). The professor notes the event violates the Civil Rights Act.

Courtesy of his complaint, “[Gustavus Adolphus College] is legally required to enforce Title VI as a condition of receiving federal financial assistance…”

The lunch is an interesting choice, perhaps particularly during February — otherwise known as Black History Month.

The 28-day observance, of course, is meant to recognize black Americans who’ve managed fantastic feats. They’re people who have changed the country (and maybe the world), not by pigmentation, but creativity, drive, intellect, courage, and/or commitment to a mission.

But as we’re being increasingly told, that’s the old reason for paying someone their due. In fact, meritocracy itself is racist.

Furthermore, practices which previously led to black Americans making history — according to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture in 2020 — are traits of whiteness:

Rugged Individualism

The Nuclear Family

Objective Thinking

Believing Hard Work is the Key to Success

Planning for Future

Delayed Gratification

Action Orientation

Decision-Making

The Smithsonian isn’t alone in its view:

In Honor of Black History Month, University Asks, 'Is Professionalism a Racist Construct?' https://t.co/O3ouwUgWyE

— Greg Adkins (@Soreknuckles) February 8, 2022

Simultaneously, our current culture’s trophy room is filled with plates and plaques reading “For Participation.” We’re in the age of the selfie stick. And progressively, we’re being told our race defines us.

Thus, whereas once you may have been welcomed to an exclusive gathering based on your life-choice laurels, now you’ll be catered to simply because your tint is tan.

Or, evidently, at Gustavus Adolphus College, you’ll be punished due to your non-meritocratic lack of melanin.

As Professor Mark told the Chicago branch of the OCR, “White faculty and staff are illegally excluded from this discriminatory, illegal, segregated event on the basis of color, race, and national origin.”

Here’s more:

I couldn’t help but notice the irony that the College’s “Office of Equity and Inclusion” is hosting and sponsoring an event that clearly promotes “inequity and exclusion” rather than equity and inclusion by unfairly excluding White faculty and staff. … Further at least for the purposes of the luncheon event the College’s slogan “You Belong Here” doesn’t apply to White faculty and staff. Rather for White faculty staff, it would be more appropriate for the College to say “You Don’t Belong Here,” at least not at this event.

As you likely know, though technology has moved on from typewriters, America remains a user of white-out:

State University Hosts a Cabaret Showcase for All Students but White Ones

College Op-Ed Asks if White People Should Be Kicked out of Parties

Student Leaders Petition University to Evict ‘Wealthy and White’ Attendees, Give Their Houses to LGBT and Others

Tennessee University Segregates Students for ‘Antiracism’ Training, Hails the Absence of White People as ‘Magical’

Back to Gustavus Adolphus College — which is, incidentally, a Lutheran school — the food on February 25th will hopefully be delicious.

For the sake of those not white who work there, with any luck, it won’t just taste like patronization.

-ALEX

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